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Ensuring Able Representation For Publicly-Funded Criminal Defendants: Lessons From England, Peter W. Tague
Ensuring Able Representation For Publicly-Funded Criminal Defendants: Lessons From England, Peter W. Tague
Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works
While there are skilled private defense lawyers who enthusiastically represent indigent criminal defendants, too often defense lawyers whose income depends upon appointments provide deplorable representation. The problem is well known and pervasive. In addition to the blizzard of claims on appeal of ineffective representation, defenders' efforts have been savaged by judges and by fellow lawyers. These nagging problems persist: to induce private lawyers to represent their clients effectively by eliciting the defendant's story and managing their relationship in a way that at least does not displease the defendant; investigating his and the prosecution's positions; pressing the prosecution for discovery, for …
Economic Incentives In Representing Publicly-Funded Criminal Defendants In England's Crown Court, Peter W. Tague
Economic Incentives In Representing Publicly-Funded Criminal Defendants In England's Crown Court, Peter W. Tague
Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works
The flux now engulfing the way in which the defenders of indigent criminal defendants are compensated in England's Crown Court provides a sober lesson for U.S. lawyers. Once, U.S. lawyers, who themselves are appointed to represent indigent defendants, could have cited English practice to support a hefty increase in the meager compensation they receive in many jurisdictions. For in balancing the tension between encouraging effective representation, but at bearable social cost, U.S. jurisdictions stress the latter, all but ignoring the former. The English approach, by contrast, has paid generously, at least in serious cases, thereby implicitly recognizing that defenders could …